Land Use Law Update: Reed v. Town of Gilbert Redux

The Winter 2015 Land Use Law Update asked whether the Supreme Court’s decision in Reed v. Town of Gilbert would require municipalities throughout the country to rewrite their sign codes. The short answer is “yes.”At a minimum, following the Supreme Court’s decision that the Town of Gilbert’s temporary directional sign regulations violated petitioners Good News Community Church’s and Pastor Clyde Reed’s First Amendment rights, municipalities will want to act quickly to amend their sign codes if they regulate different categories of signs differently. A code that places fewer restrictions on political or ideological signs than on directional signs likely will not withstand judicial review. Whether codes that differentiate between commercial and noncommercial signs will withstand review is an open question, but application of the Court’s content neutrality analysis would appear to require strict scrutiny of even commercial-noncommercial distinctions — and if the governmental justifications for the distinction are aesthetics and traffic safety, which they so often are, this distinction also likely will not withstand judicial review

Land Use Law Update: New York\u27s New Climate Change Resiliency Law

New York State’s lawmakers passed 2,603 bills over the course of the 2013-14 session, 658 of which passed both houses. Although counties and local governments are likely focusing their attention on budget-related items such as the property tax freeze/rebate program, local governments — and zoning and planning officials and practitioners in particular — should also take note of the newly enacted Community Risk and Resiliency Act (CRRA)

Sink or Swim: In Search of a Model for Coastal City Climate Resilience

New York City, like other major cities around the world, has acknowledged the problem of climate change, undertaken a comprehensive risk assessment, created a suite of adaptation and mitigation planning initiatives, and begun to implement policies to decrease the city’s contribution to the problem and to make the city less vulnerable to the effects of climate change. This detailed analysis of the city’s climate change resilience initiatives concludes that, although many of the city’s initiatives provide a model for other coastal communities, the initiatives likely still fall short of what is required to sufficiently moderate harm from dangerous interference with the climate system. The city’s robust suite of initiatives put it ahead of the pack as compared to most other U.S. municipalities, especially with respect to comprehensive reform of zoning and building codes, integrated mitigation and adaptation planning, transparent climate change-related data analysis initiatives, and commitment to reduce GHG emissions 80% by 2050 from 2005 levels and progress toward that goal. However, the city also faces a host of wicked policy binds, ineffective regional structures, a lack of support at the federal level, and numerous conditions that constrain its ability to remain resilient. In light of this, the “toughness” theme that runs throughout the city’s plans risks undermining its robust data analysis and reporting initiatives by instilling in New Yorkers a false sense of security with respect to both the scope of the problem and their local government’s ability to protect them from it. The city faces an equally wicked policy bind with respect to waterfront development. Given the foreseeable risks of increasingly intensive and frequent coastal storms, flooding and storm surges, coastal municipalities must carefully evaluate their waterfront development policies to assure consistency with future climate risks and vulnerability and adopt regulations that curtail or eliminate waterfront development in high-risk areas, encourage or require relocation away from vulnerable areas, and take maximum advantage of opportunities to develop natural flood-mitigation infrastructure

Land Use Law Update: Reed v. Town of Gilbert Redux

The Winter 2015 Land Use Law Update asked whether the Supreme Court’s decision in Reed v. Town of Gilbert would require municipalities throughout the country to rewrite their sign codes. The short answer is “yes.”At a minimum, following the Supreme Court’s decision that the Town of Gilbert’s temporary directional sign regulations violated petitioners Good News Community Church’s and Pastor Clyde Reed’s First Amendment rights, municipalities will want to act quickly to amend their sign codes if they regulate different categories of signs differently. A code that places fewer restrictions on political or ideological signs than on directional signs likely will not withstand judicial review. Whether codes that differentiate between commercial and noncommercial signs will withstand review is an open question, but application of the Court’s content neutrality analysis would appear to require strict scrutiny of even commercial-noncommercial distinctions — and if the governmental justifications for the distinction are aesthetics and traffic safety, which they so often are, this distinction also likely will not withstand judicial review

Land Use Law Update: The Court of Appeals Issues a Victory for Home Rule in Wallach v. Town of Dryden and Cooperstown Holstein Corp. v. Town of Middlefield

In the midst of the often heated controversy swirling around the issue of hydraulic fracturing (commonly referred to as “hydrofracking” and “fracking”), New York’s Court of Appeals recently issued a straightforward ruling, which focused on long-established precedent concerning the right of municipalities to regulate mining land uses, rather than focusing on the contentious economic or environmental issues surrounding the fracking debate. This article discusses that ruling

Land Use Law Update: New York\u27s New Climate Change Resiliency Law

New York State’s lawmakers passed 2,603 bills over the course of the 2013-14 session, 658 of which passed both houses. Although counties and local governments are likely focusing their attention on budget-related items such as the property tax freeze/rebate program, local governments — and zoning and planning officials and practitioners in particular — should also take note of the newly enacted Community Risk and Resiliency Act (CRRA)

Sink or Swim: In Search of a Model for Coastal City Climate Resilience

New York City, like other major cities around the world, has acknowledged the problem of climate change, undertaken a comprehensive risk assessment, created a suite of adaptation and mitigation planning initiatives, and begun to implement policies to decrease the city’s contribution to the problem and to make the city less vulnerable to the effects of climate change. This detailed analysis of the city’s climate change resilience initiatives concludes that, although many of the city’s initiatives provide a model for other coastal communities, the initiatives likely still fall short of what is required to sufficiently moderate harm from dangerous interference with the climate system. The city’s robust suite of initiatives put it ahead of the pack as compared to most other U.S. municipalities, especially with respect to comprehensive reform of zoning and building codes, integrated mitigation and adaptation planning, transparent climate change-related data analysis initiatives, and commitment to reduce GHG emissions 80% by 2050 from 2005 levels and progress toward that goal. However, the city also faces a host of wicked policy binds, ineffective regional structures, a lack of support at the federal level, and numerous conditions that constrain its ability to remain resilient. In light of this, the “toughness” theme that runs throughout the city’s plans risks undermining its robust data analysis and reporting initiatives by instilling in New Yorkers a false sense of security with respect to both the scope of the problem and their local government’s ability to protect them from it. The city faces an equally wicked policy bind with respect to waterfront development. Given the foreseeable risks of increasingly intensive and frequent coastal storms, flooding and storm surges, coastal municipalities must carefully evaluate their waterfront development policies to assure consistency with future climate risks and vulnerability and adopt regulations that curtail or eliminate waterfront development in high-risk areas, encourage or require relocation away from vulnerable areas, and take maximum advantage of opportunities to develop natural flood-mitigation infrastructure

Land Use Law Update: The 2015 Mid-Year Roundup

This update summarizes New York cases related to land use and zoning that were decided in the first half of 2015

Land Use Law Update: The Court of Appeals Issues a Victory for Home Rule in Wallach v. Town of Dryden and Cooperstown Holstein Corp. v. Town of Middlefield

In the midst of the often heated controversy swirling around the issue of hydraulic fracturing (commonly referred to as “hydrofracking” and “fracking”), New York’s Court of Appeals recently issued a straightforward ruling, which focused on long-established precedent concerning the right of municipalities to regulate mining land uses, rather than focusing on the contentious economic or environmental issues surrounding the fracking debate. This article discusses that ruling

Land Use Law Update: The 2015 Mid-Year Roundup

This update summarizes New York cases related to land use and zoning that were decided in the first half of 2015